A Letter To SILK.

LETTER TO SILK
R.I.P. 2002
Do you remember when first I saw you sitting in the weld mesh cage at Neuarpurr?

Six weeks old and all alone among a tangle of deerhound/wolfhound cross siblings that knew nothing of the pain and anxiety of the runt of
the litter
Do you recall the relief of recognition of your plight and the instant love and devotion - both ways - that would last your lifetime

Remember the climb of Mt. Steve at Dargo when you were 8 weeks old and wouldn’t be left behind? And how I carried you in my jacket
back down the mountain

And when I was saddling the buckskin colt at Panton Hill and you disappeared - 10 months old. Never been away from my side. And how I found you looking so contented? You looked like you could have been smoking a cigarette? And yes! You were pregnant!

Of course you remember.

Having those eight beautiful pups how could you not. And what a fantastic mum you were. Discipline? You bet!

How you did the city living bit in Melbourne for a year walking the streets with me at all hours of the day and night between shifts?

And what about Biscuit, the red staghound bitch you took hunting at Mt. Boswell and somehow got her lost? Never to be seen again.

For seven years your great mate Wattle? The tragedy of his early demise?


Remember Sammy? And how he climbed in your mouth to bite your tongue when he was a kitten? And how he always brought you and Wattle fresh killed rabbits?

What about the time I left you with the dog catcher at Eltham because I had to catch the train to the city and when I went to pick you up I found you trotting about with him while fifty or sixty other dogs had to make do with being locked up?

And at Monsalvat at the Jazz Festival when you “adopted” the two year old boy and when his parents turned up you demanded they back off until you had checked their bona fides?

And you never lost that maternal streak either, playing mother to joeys and lambs and kittens and kids of both persuasions and adopted pups. How even in to your fourteenth year you had time to shadow box for hours with Nelungaloo “Mick”?
‘Course you do.

And I remember you.

For fifteen years my sidekick.

I remember you.
Wally Atkinson.